Mandeville's Fable of the Bees [pp. 168-175]

NO TREASON.
and exercising each his natural rights, and not by their govern ments in the exercise of their constitutional powers.
It was, therefore, as individuals, and only as individuals, each
acting for himself alone, that they declared that their consent that is, their individual consent, for each one could consent only
for himself-was necessary to the creation or perpetuity of any
government that they could rightfully be called on to support.
In the same way each declared for himself, that his own will,
pleasure and discretion were the only authorities he had any
occasion to consult in determining whether he would any longer
support the government under which he had always lived. And
if this action of each individual were valid and rightful when he
had so many other individuals to keep him company, it would
have been, in the view of natural justice and right, equally valid
and rightful if he had taken the same step alone. He had the
same natural right to take up arms alone to defend his own property against a single tax-gatherer that he had to take up arms
in company with three millions of others to defend the property
of all against an army of tax-gatherers.
Thus the whole Revolution turned upon, asserted, and, in
theory, established the right of each and every man, at his discretion, to release himself from the support of the government
under which he had lived. And this principle was asserted, not
as a right peculiar to themselves, or to that time, or as applicable
only to the government then existing, but as a universal right of
all men, at all times and under all circumstances.
George the Third called our ancestors traitors for what they
did at that time. But they were not traitors in fact, whatever
he or his laws may have called them. They were not traitors in
fact, because they betrayed nobody, and broke faith with nobody.
They were his equals, owing him no allegiance, obedience, nor
any other duty, except such as they owed to mankind at large.
Their political relations with him had been purely voluntary.
They had never pledged their faith to him that they would continue these relations any longer than it should please them to do
so; and therefore they broke no faith in parting with him. They
simply exercised their natural right of saying to him, and to the
English people, that they were under no obligation to continue
their political connexion with them, and that, for reasons of their
own, they chose to dissolve it.
What was true of our ancestors is true of revolutionists in
general. The monarchs and governments from whom they choose
to separate attempt to stigmatize them as traitors. But they are
not traitors in fact, inasmruch as they betray and break faith
with no one. Having pledged no faith, they break none. They
are simply men, who, for reasons of their own- whether good or
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